WEINGARTEN RLTY INV. v. Harris Cty Apprais.

93 S.W.3d 280
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedJuly 25, 2002
Docket14-01-00094-CV
StatusPublished

This text of 93 S.W.3d 280 (WEINGARTEN RLTY INV. v. Harris Cty Apprais.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
WEINGARTEN RLTY INV. v. Harris Cty Apprais., 93 S.W.3d 280 (Tex. Ct. App. 2002).

Opinion

93 S.W.3d 280 (2002)

WEINGARTEN REALTY INVESTORS, Appellant,
v.
HARRIS COUNTY APPRAISAL DISTRICT, Appellee.

No. 14-01-00094-CV.

Court of Appeals of Texas, Houston (14th Dist.).

July 25, 2002.

*282 Laurellen Elizabeth Ratliff, Mark Stephen Hutcheson, William Ikard, Austin, for appellants.

Robert P. McConnell, Houston, for appellees.

Panel consists of Chief Justice BRISTER and Justices ANDERSON and FROST.

OPINION ON MOTION FOR REHEARING

KEM THOMPSON FROST, Justice.

We overrule appellant Weingarten Realty Investors's motion for rehearing. We withdraw the opinion issued in this case on May 2, 2002, and we substitute the following opinion in its place.

INTRODUCTION

This is a property-tax-appraisal case involving alleged unequal taxation of commercial property owned by Weingarten Realty Investors. Weingarten appeals the trial court's judgment in favor of the Harris County Appraisal District ("HCAD"). We affirm the trial court's judgment.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

Weingarten purchased Champion's Village Shopping Center in December 1998, for $36 million. Champion's Village is located at FM 1960 and Champion Forest Drive in Houston, Harris County, Texas, and contains approximately 400,000 square feet of net rentable area.

HCAD appraised Champion's Village Shopping Center at $30 million for the 1999 tax year. Weingarten protested HCAD's appraisal, and after exhausting its administrative remedies, timely appealed to the district court. In its petition, Weingarten made two claims of entitlement to relief for the 1999 tax year under the Texas Tax Code. Weingarten contended the appraised value of Champion's Village Shopping Center was in excess of its fair market value under the Texas Constitution. Weingarten also contended the appraised value was unequal to the appraised values of several comparable properties for purposes of ad valorem taxation. Weingarten later nonsuited the excessive-valuation appeal and proceeded to trial solely on its unequal-appraisal claim.

Before trial began, HCAD filed a motion to exclude the testimony of Weingarten's sole expert witness, David Dominy. The motion, filed under E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Co. v. Robinson, 923 S.W.2d 549, 556 (Tex.1995), raised four main arguments: (1) Dominy did not consider fair market values in conducting his analysis; (2) in making his value adjustments, Dominy did not consider the economic characteristics of Champion's Village Shopping Center or of the "assessment comparables" that Dominy selected; (3) Dominy did not include a reasonable number of comparable properties in his analysis; and *283 (4) Dominy's value adjustments were not based upon any quantitative analysis. In its third argument, HCAD raised objections to the selectivity and substantive quality of the comparable properties as well as to the quantity of them. In its fourth argument, HCAD objected to Dominy's ipse dixit used to make the required adjustments to the comparable properties under section 42.26(d) of the Texas Tax Code.

Rather than conduct a pretrial Robinson hearing, because it was a bench trial, the trial court "carried the motion." At trial, Dominy testified Champion's Village was unequally appraised and its equal-appraised value was $19,149,962—more than $10 million less than HCAD's 1999 appraisal. At the conclusion of the one-day bench trial, the trial court requested post-trial briefs in lieu of closing arguments. Along with its brief, Weingarten submitted additional evidence for purposes of HCAD's Robinson challenge— the affidavits of Breck Bostwick and Ronald Little. About six weeks after the trial, the court entered an order excluding the testimony of Dominy and simultaneously signed a take-nothing judgment against Weingarten. Weingarten filed a motion to reconsider and motion for new trial. The motion for new trial was overruled by operation of law, and after a hearing on the motion to reconsider, the trial court entered no further orders.

ISSUES PRESENTED

Weingarten presents three issues for review:

(1) Did the trial court abuse its discretion in excluding Weingarten's expert witness by misinterpreting and misapplying section 42.26(d) of the Texas Tax Code?

(2) Does Robinson apply to the trial court's exclusion of Dominy's testimony, and if it does, did the trial court abuse its discretion in excluding Dominy's testimony under Robinson?

(3) Is Weingarten entitled to an award of reasonable attorney's fees?

STANDARD OF REVIEW

We review an order excluding an expert witness under an abuse-of-discretion standard. Helena Chem. Co. v. Wilkins, 47 S.W.3d 486, 499 (Tex.2001). The trial court abuses its discretion when its ruling is arbitrary, unreasonable, or made without reference to any guiding rules or legal principles. See Bocquet v. Herring, 972 S.W.2d 19, 21 (Tex.1998). We must uphold the trial court's evidentiary ruling if there is any legitimate basis for it. Owens-Corning Fiberglas Corp. v. Malone, 972 S.W.2d 35, 43 (Tex.1998).

The trial court did not enter findings of fact or conclusions of law. Therefore, we view the trial court's judgment as impliedly finding all the facts necessary to support its judgment. See Worford v. Stamper, 801 S.W.2d 108, 109 (Tex.1990). Weingarten also challenges the trial court's implied findings underlying the judgment and exclusion order by contesting the legal and factual sufficiency of the evidence to support them. See Worford, 801 S.W.2d at 109. Under an abuse-of-discretion standard, legal and factual sufficiency challenges are not independent grounds of error. See Beaumont Bank, N.A. v. Buller, 806 S.W.2d 223, 226 (Tex. 1991); In re D.S., 76 S.W.3d 512, 516 (Tex.App.-Houston [14th Dist.] 2002, no pet.).

ANALYSIS

We begin by addressing HCAD's contention that Weingarten waived a portion of the argument it now brings on appeal. In its motion to exclude expert testimony, HCAD attacked the reliability *284 of Dominy's foundational data. On appeal, HCAD argues Weingarten waived review as to HCAD's argument that Dominy's calculations are unreliable because they are based on only portions of comparable retail centers. HCAD claims Weingarten did not specifically address this argument in its original brief. We disagree. As Weingarten points out in its reply brief, appellate courts treat an issue or point as covering every subsidiary question that is fairly included in the issue or point. See Tex.R.App. P. 38.1(e); see also Stephenson v. LeBoeuf, 16 S.W.3d 829, 843-44 (Tex. App.-Houston [14th Dist.] 2000, pet. denied). Weingarten's brief presented the following issue: "Whether the trial court abused its discretion in excluding Dominy's testimony under Robinson?" In Robinson.,

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Weingarten Realty Investors v. Harris County Appraisal District
93 S.W.3d 280 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 2002)

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